


cheshire cat smile (we're all mad here)

by afterism



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-09
Updated: 2010-06-09
Packaged: 2017-10-10 00:41:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/93368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afterism/pseuds/afterism
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>episode 5.10 (Vincent and the Doctor) missing scene. <i>there's nothing quite as beautiful as the things you see.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	cheshire cat smile (we're all mad here)

This is better than any sight-seeing tour through time and space - lying under the stars, watching the dance of the night sky through the eyes of someone who sees beauty like no other. The world is alive around them; the trees stirring in the midnight breeze and distant dark bird song, but they're alone for miles around and this, here, this perfect quiet moment feels like celebrating - it's not a victory, there's nothing to celebrate in something dying frightened and alone - but they're alive and existing in this instant and it's enough that when Amy rolls over and kisses Vincent, her knees in the dust and grass prickling her palms, Vincent notices the way the Doctor's hand slips against his.

The wind drops for a short while, stillness settling over them and Amy, bold, brilliant Amy kisses Vincent like he's the most important man in the universe and the Doctor can only watch, because he knows things that neither of them can and Vincent's fingers are still enclosed around his palm.

He is many things, but he's never been someone who was happy to sit back and observe (especially - well, always). He shifts on the pretence on a stone digging into his ribs, which there is, and a need to go back to the TARDIS, which there isn't, but when he tries to gently pull his hand away Vincent doesn't let go - he and Amy both pause, breaking away to look straight at him and, oh, he forgot how humans can be telepathic sometimes. Vincent's hand tugs again and Amy reaches for him, shifting her legs so she's straddling Vincent and can brush a hand through the Doctor's hair - they stare at each other, lost for an instant but then the Doctor brings his hand up to close over hers and pushes himself up onto his elbows as she leans down and they meet somewhere in the middle, awkward and unbalanced until Amy laughs against his mouth and slips her hand around to the back of his neck, tugging him closer so he has to shuffle closer and sit up properly and then, yes, that works.

They fit together, lips sliding against each other and it's familiar and strange and then the Doctor tilts his head so only their foreheads are touching, his free hand cupping her jaw and everything shifts again.

"This won't work," he says, eyes closed and just holding her. She reaches up to link their fingers together.

"I wasn't suggesting anything long term," she says, and then, what. There's a memory that makes no sense, preserved because she's a time traveller now but something heartbreaking has happened. She pulls away, just for a second as there's the opposite of a flash - a plunge into darkness that leaves no impression other than emptiness.

The Doctor and Vincent are watching her when she looks up from their hands, still connected at the fingertips, wide-eyed and looking at her like she's about to break. She can't remember why they stopped.

"What?"

"Oh, _Amy_," the Doctor says, and kisses her before she can pull away and make a face at him. She relents because there's no reason not to, kissing back with unpractised ease, her fingers linked with the Doctor's whose hand is in Vincent's who is bringing Amy's palm to his lips, still lying flat on the hard ground but unhurried to move and content to watch as his two strange, wonderful companions connect in the darkness above. Amy moves first, untangling her hand from the Doctor's just so she can slip a hand under his shirt, her fingers almost burning against his night-cool skin and he sucks in a breath, sharp against her mouth and she grins, wicked. His spare hand threads through her hair in retaliation, simply insistently gathering her closer. The wind picks up, tugging her hair from between the Doctor's fingers; it floats, winds around and entwines them together, orange against blue against tweed and it's impossible Amy Pond and the Doctor, bright against a glowing world.

When they pull away again Vincent is watching them with a half smile, like he can see something they can't.

It follows that they don't ask, just smile back (Amy, wide and twinkling; the Doctor, lips closed but soft and happy) and pull him up in unison as Amy sits back on her heels and watches her boys - the most natural thing in the universe as the Doctor leans over and presses his smile against Vincent's unsure lips - and it's beautiful as they collapse together, Amy's giggles mixed with the Doctor's huffed chuckles with the way Vincent throws his head back and _laughs_, free and open and then Amy's crying and her boys, they kiss it away before she notices her damp cheeks are hurting with laughter. It's celebratory and consolatory for unpronounceable things and Vincent's beard is scratchier than the grass, drawing across her skin and it is perfectly impossibly _real_.

"Stay," Vincent whispers, half lost in the stirrings of the universe and the Doctor hears it all despite knowing he shouldn't and - he wants to, he wants to stay and he wants to take them both away and make them safe among the stars but look how that has turned out, time and time again, and Amy breathes something against his ear, a forgotten name that makes his fingers crook and Amy gasp and -- and the Doctor misses him more than it is possible to say, but he's the only one who knows just how much this is about him.

The night moves with them, the scent of the darkness and the stars surrounding them as the clouds swirl and drift past. They make a makeshift blanket to stretch out on, out of jackets and loose, paint-stained shirts, and they curl up together with the gentlest of breezes ghosting across bare skin, and Vincent talks as Amy presses a kiss to the line of his hip and the Doctor strokes a hand through her hair. There are moments like this, where they just fit and it works without negotiation, but mostly there are too many elbows and the Doctor still adjusting to his new body with old motor memories and Amy is too impatient and Vincent is too hesitant and sometimes a laugh bubbles up and sparks off the closest expanse of skin and it's more magnificent than can be articulated in anything other than a babble of sounds.

When the stars burst above like a festival of colours (and, the Doctor thinks about that for a moment, about taking her to every impossibly beautiful place in the entirety of time and space and, maybe, it's questionable but sometimes he wants to enjoy the universe instead of just saving it. He thinks about bursts of powder and pigment and technicolour planets with continents made out of quartz, and makes connections instead of plans) they are still holding hands, fingers linked together and they are an absurd tangle of limbs, unravelled in the night air.

Vincent draws with his fingertip brushing over the Doctor's chest, curves and lines that are visible only to him, tracing ribs and heartbeats. Amy lies curled up on the Doctor's other side, using his arm for a pillow and drifting in quiet sleep with his jacket keeping her warm, and the Doctor lies back, eyes closed and a smile in the corner of his lips.

"Can you see it now, Doctor?"

And, no, he can't, but this is the way the universe works and the shake of his laughter wakes up Amy. She stretches, her smile still dangerous when drenched in sleep, and when she blinks up at her boys they all know it's time to go; shrugging on clothes and quiet grins and settling off across the dewy fields as dawn rises in blues and golds.

  
_I tell you, the more I think, the more I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people. _  
\- Vincent van Gogh


End file.
